the committee imagine, would have produced as good an effect. But I have not the least disposition to controvert the merits of Mr. Fitch. From all I have ever heard or learned respecting him, I believe he was a man of uncommon natural genius, and great mechanical ingenuity. If it be true that he died in poverty and broken hearted, I sincerely lament that he is one whose name is to be added to the list of those who have found, that merit has so little power to command the smiles of fortune. But while this sympathy may be justly due to Mr. Fitch, let not envy, jealousy or cupidity harden our hearts against all feeling for the fate of Fulton. He fell a sacrifice to his labour and ingenuity. He died immensely in debt, incurred by the pursuit, to which he was encouraged by those acts of the legislature now under consideration. And nothing can rescue his family from the embarrassments he has left, but that protection and support from the state, which, after the legislative transactions of 1814, he had so much reason to suppose were secured.

I must be pardoned for having been led by a desire to notice the facts above stated into some digression. I resume the consideration of the objection against the grant to Mr. Livingston, founded on its interference with the previous grant to Mr. Fitch.

I will admit, as I have said, for the purposes of this argument, that Mr. Fitch's boat was all that

you desire it should appear to have been. Does it thence follow that there was any injustice in resuming the privilege granted to him, when he had omitted to avail himself of it for more than ten years? If Mr. Fitch had constructed a boat which was equal to the representations he made to the legislature in 1787, and had, at the time that his grant was within three years of expiring, neglected, notwithstanding his success, to exhibit or even to make an attempt to exhibit, such performance, on the waters of this state, the legislature was perfectly justifiable in resuming a privilege which they had conferred, with an intention of its being used, on one who would make no use of it, and in granting it to another who they had every reason. to believe would, if in his power, avail himself of the benefit.

Suppose Mr. Fitch's boat had been found as capable of being beneficially employed as Mr. Fulton's now are; and that such boats had been put in operation on the waters of Pennsylvania, and the rivers of our sister states; but that, through the influence of some rival state, or for some other reason, Mr. Fitch had not chosen to employ any boat on the waters of this state. Let it be further supposed, that when the sister states had been for ten years enjoying all the advantages of this great invention, you had been a member of the legislature, and Chancellor Livingston, or any other person, had represented to you, that he was willing to in

cur the expense of building and putting in ope eration steam boats on our waters, but that he was deterred from doing so by the existence of the act in favor of Fitch. What would you have said? Would you have told the Chancellor, that though Fitch had not thought proper to avail himself of this grant, yet that the state must be content to forego the advantages they might otherwise have enjoyed until the time limited for the expiration of the exclusive right? No! I am convinced that this would not have been your language and notwithstanding the strong preju❤ dices you have imbibed against the claimants, under the rights of Livingston and Fulton, I do not believe it would even now be your deliberate judgment. I am confident you would say, in such a case as I have supposed, that the exclusive grant to Mr. Fitch must necessarily be understood to have been, upon condition that he should within a reasonable time give the state the benefit of his invention; that he should in a reasonable time, employ his boats on our waters, and that if he had failed to do so, it was perfectly just the state should resume the grant.

Now the act passed in favor of Mr. Livingston, in 1798, recites that it had been suggested that Fitch "was either dead or had withdrawn himself from this state, without having made any attempt in the space of more than ten years for executing the plan for which he had obtained an exclusive

privilege." Was not this suggestion or recital "true in fact?" Were not (to use the words of the act)" the employment and navigation of boats impelled by the force of steam or fire, within the jurisdiction of this state," that for the execution of which he obtained his exclusive privilege? Was not this the useful improvement which it was the object of the act to encourage? Or, will it be con❤ tended, that the intention of the legislature was fulfilled, and that the condition of the law was satisfied, by Fitch's having constructed a boat in Pennsylvania and moved her on the waters of that state? Nay, would the object of the legislature of our state have been accomplished if Fitch had covered the waters of the sister states with steamboats as perfect as the boats that now navigate the Hudson? I am persuaded that these questions cannot by any reasonable man be answered in the affirmative. If so, then those suggestions in the act in favor of Livingston were true in fact. "That Fitch had withdrawn from the state and had died abroad is admitted, and it has never been contended that he made any attempt to execute his plan on the waters of this state. Under these circumstances the legislature were certainly warranted in the conclusion which they have expressed in the act of 1798, that the exclusive privilege granted to Fitch was "justly forfeited."

Let us

But let us suppose that it were not so. suppose there was injustice in repealing Fitch's law

and in conferring on Chancellor Livingston the privileges previously granted to Fitch. The injustice being towards Mr. Fitch or his representatives only, no other person had any right to complain, If the law in favor of Chancellor Livingston interfered with a prior grant, the prior grantee or his representatives might with great propriety maintain that the subsequent grant, so far as it had deprived them of any advantage was unjust. But to authorize Mr. Fitch or his representatives to make this complaint, they must have shewn that he or they had attempted, or at least intended to avail themselves of the exclusive privileges conferred by the act under which they claimed. This never was and never could have been pretended. In 1799, two years before the expiration of the time limited for the duration of Fitch's exclusive privilege, this first grant to Mr. Livingston, by reason of the condition not being fulfilled, expired. Why did not Fitch, or his representatives or his associates, the company formed with a view to enjoy the benefits of his exclusive privilege, in this very state, why did not they then prefer their claim, or object to the passing of a new law in favor of Mr. Livingston? In June 1801, the second grant to Mr. Livingston expired for the same reason; and there was no other grant till 1803. Here was an interval of two years, when there was no law to interfere with any pretensions that might have been made under Fitch's grant. Why did not he, or